“I am love,” said the King very clearly. “If you want to see the pattern of true love, look at me for I am the expression of the law of love on which the universe is founded. And the very first characteristic of true love, as I have manifested it, is willingness to accept all other human beings, just as they are, however blemished and marred by sin they may be, and to acknowledge oneness with them in their sin and need. To acknowledge also that every human heart needs both to love and to be loved, and that herein lies the very root of the oneness of mankind. For unless you sons and daughters of men are loved and also love all others besides yourselves, you cannot become what you are destined to be, the sons and daughters of the God Who is Love.”

He ceased speaking, and at that moment a company of the King’s servants who had just approached the Mountain of Pomegranates in order to gather a store of the beautiful fruit, broke forth into singing as they began their work on a nearby slope. These are the words of their song:

Love is oneness— oh, how sweet
To obey this law,
The unlovely we may meet
Need our love the more
Make us one, O love, we plead,
With men’s sorrow and their need.

We are one in needing love,
(Let us true love show)
Only love’s sun from above
Makes our spirits grow.
“Love us!” this is our heart’s need,
“Let us love”— and live indeed!

We are also one in this,
We must love or die,
Loving others is true bliss,
Self-love is a lie!
Love of self is inward strife,
Love turned outward is true life.

Let us love and fruitful be,
Love is God’s own breath,
Love will kindle love and see
New life born from death.
Nowhere is a heaven more sweet
Than where loving spirits meet.

When the song had ended, the King pointed out over the wide landscape and towards the Black Mountain and said:

“See how plainly the law of the universe is demonstrated in all that love has created, and how everything which the Creator’s hand has formed and fashioned, when it obeys the law of its being, shares with others and acknowledges its oneness with the need of all. Behold how this law is indeed written in everything around you.”

So Grace and Glory looked.

Down in the valley far below were the green pastures where the flocks were grazing. She pictured all the myriad little blades of grass giving themselves freely to nourish the flocks and herds. She remembered the unnumbered wild flowers giving forth their sweetness and beauty and perfume even in places where there was no eye to see them, no onlooker to appreciate them, ready to be trampled down and broken, or else to bloom their whole life long without receiving praise or recompense. Then she looked at the trees of love growing all around them as they sat up there on the mountain, saw how laden they were with fruit which others were to pluck and enjoy, finding all the meaning of their existence in the ministry/service of giving.

She looked up at the sun shining overhead, shedding its light and warmth so freely upon all, on the evil and on the good, on the unjust as well as the just, on all alike! She saw that in its self-giving and self-sharing and in its willingness to enter into and become one with all who would open to receive its light and warmth, it was indeed the great symbol of perfect love. She looked at the streamlets all hurrying to go lower and lower and to give themselves to refresh all thirsty things along their banks. Everywhere she looked she saw nature exulting to give and to share with others, and, by thus doing, to become one with them.

Then she began to think of the many creatures who break this law of the universe; the beasts of prey, always seeking for themselves and giving nothing but to their own young; the parasites and the wild vines which had ruined Black Mountain. And she realized how destructive everything is when it will not remain in harmony with the law of love and oneness. She realized, too, that this same law was indeed written in every part of her own nature. “It is happy to love,” she thought, “and it is healthy too. It is utter misery to withhold love and to live only and always for oneself alone. I see that it is exactly as he says. Love must express itself in giving; must find a way to become one with others, just as he found a way to give his own life to us and thereby to become one with us! And all the misery down there in the valley really is because the inhabitants are breaking this law of their existence without realizing it.”

While she still sat pondering upon all this, the King himself began to sing, and these are the words of the song which he taught her up there on the Mountain of Pomegranates:

There is one law by which we live,
“Love loves to give and give!”
And on this “royal law,” so named,
The universe itself is framed
No lasting joy is anywhere
Save in the hearts of those who share,
Life yields a thousandfold and more
To those who practice love’s great law.

That love is far too weak and small
Which will love some but not all.
If love to one it will decline,
‘Tis human love and not divine.
Love cannot be content to rest
Till the beloved is fully blest.
Love leaps to succor all who fall,
And finds his joy in giving all.

When he had finished this song the King rose to his feet and said, “Now it is time to return to the lovely work of self-giving and sharing.” And with that he pointed to down the the mountain slopes, and then together they went bounding down the mountain on their “hinds’ feet,” down toward the little green carpet far below which was the Valley of Humiliation where their ministry/service of love was so much needed.

“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the assembly and gave Himself up on its behalf, that He might sanctify it, cleansing it by the washing of the water in the Word, that He might present it to Himself as the glorious assembly, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such things, but that it be holy and without blemish. So, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies, he loving his wife loves himself, for then no one hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, even as also the Lord the assembly. For we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. “For this, a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh.” (Gen. 2:24). The mystery is great, but I speak as to Christ and as to the assembly. However, you also, everyone, let each one love his wife as himself, and the wife, that she give deference to the husband.”
— Ephesians 5, the apostle Paul

1 Who has believed our report? And to whom is the arm of Yahweh revealed?

2 For He comes up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form nor magnificence that we should see Him; nor form that we should desire Him.

3 He is despised and abandoned of men, a Man of pains, and acquainted with sickness. And as it were hiding our faces from Him, He being despised, and we did not value Him.

4 Surely He has borne our sicknesses, and He carried our pain; yet we esteemed Him plagued, smitten by God, and afflicted.

5 But He was wounded for our transgressions; He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His wounds we ourselves are healed.

6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have each one turned to his own way; and Yahweh made meet in Him the iniquity of all of us.

7 He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, but He did not open His mouth. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter; and as a ewe before her shearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.

8 He was taken from prison and from justice; and who shall consider His generation? For He was cut off out of the land of the living; from the transgression of My people, the stroke was to Him.

9 And He appointed Him His grave with the wicked, but He was with a rich man in His death; though He had done no violence, and deceit was not in His mouth.

10 But Yahweh pleased to crush Him, to make Him sick, so that If He should put His soul as a guilt offering, He shall see His seed; He shall prolong His days; and the will of Yahweh shall prosper in His hand.

11 He shall see the fruit of the travail of His soul; He shall be fully satisfied. By His knowledge the righteous One, My Servant, shall justify for many, and He shall bear their iniquities.

12 Because of this I will divide to Him with the great, and with the strong He shall divide the spoil; because He poured out His soul to death; and He was counted with those transgressing; and He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for those transgressing.

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through Him, and without Him not even one thing came into being that has come into being. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men; 5 and the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it. 6 There was a man sent from God; his name was John. 7 He came for a witness, that he might witness concerning the Light, that all might believe through Him. 8 He was not that Light, but that he might witness concerning the Light. 9 He was the true Light; He enlightens every man coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through Him, yet the world did not know Him. 11 He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. 12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave authority to become children of God, to the ones believing into His name, 13 who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but were born of God. 14 And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us. And we beheld His glory, glory as of an only begotten from the Father, full of grace and of truth. 15 John witnesses concerning Him, and has cried out, saying, This One was He of whom I said, He coming after me has been before me, for He was preceding me. 16 And out of His fullness we all received, and grace on top of grace. 17 For the Law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, that One declares Him.